Simulator, Mercury Procedures Trainer

This simulator was used by astronauts in Project Mercury, the United States' first human space flight program. Astronauts spent many hours of training in this and other simulators to practice spacecraft operations and procedures. Switches, gauges, dials, and controls inside it were connected to electronic circuits, which recreated what would happen in a real spacecraft during an actual mission.

After the successful completion of Project Mercury, the trainer was given to the Smithsonian by the NASA Langley Research Center, where it had been used.